Sublime

Lilla Perry had met Claude Monet in 1889, and for two decades she spent several months every summer in a rented house next door to the artist’s studio and gardens at Giverny, fifty miles west of Paris along the Seine.

Lilla Cabot Perry,

Monet, I realize, has painted that aspect of the world that can’t be domesticated by vision—what Emerson called the “flash and sparkle” of it, in this case a million dappled reflections rocking and melting in the waves.

“I’m Mrs. Burns-Cooper,” said the woman, “and after this, well, it’s all right this time, because it’s your first time, but after this time always use the back entrance.” There is a pear in my icebox, and one end of rye bread. Except for three Irish potatoes and a cup of flour and the empty Christmas boxes, there is absolutely nothing on my shelf.